To start things off, two of ResearchBlogging's Editors did a joint blogcast this week. Listen to Travis and I discuss the relative benefits of using self-report data. Check out Travis's take on our conversation, and mine.

The Lies That Data Tell. Richard N. Landers describes an important new paper from the journal Psychological Science about how tests of statistical significance can mislead us.

The Plastic Brains of Birds. NeuroKuz reviews some recent research in the neurobiology of learning in songbirds, and its implications for understanding neural plasticity.

How The Brain Controls The (Non)Body. Studies of motor control investigate how the brain controls the body. Carl Kingston describes a study from the emerging field of neuroprosthetics - how the brain controls something other than the body.

The views expressed are those of the author(s) and are not necessarily those of Scientific American.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR(S)

Jason G. Goldman

Jason G. Goldman is a science journalist based in Los Angeles. He has written about animal behavior, wildlife biology, conservation, and ecology for Scientific American, Los Angeles magazine, The Washington Post, The Guardian, the BBC, Conservation magazine, and elsewhere. He contributes to Scientific American's "60-Second Science" podcast, and is co-editor of Science Blogging: The Essential Guide (Yale University Press). He enjoys sharing his wildlife knowledge on television and on the radio, and often speaks to the public about wildlife and science communication.

Scientific American is part of Springer Nature, which owns or has commercial relations with thousands of scientific publications (many of them can be found at www.springernature.com/us). Scientific American maintains a strict policy of editorial independence in reporting developments in science to our readers.